ROME - Italian and British scientists want to exhume the body of 16th century astronomer Galileo for DNA tests to determine if his severe vision problems may have affected some of his findings. The scientists told Reuters on Thursday that DNA tests would help answer some unresolved questions about the health of the man known as the father of astronomy, whom the Vatican condemned for teaching that the earth revolves around the sun.

TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. — A legal squabble about the exhumation of Notre Dame football hero George Gipp’s remains may have ended with an appellate court’s refusal to take the case. A Michigan Court of Appeals panel last month voted 2-1 not to hear an appeal of a local judge’s decision to throw out a lawsuit filed by two men who say they are distant cousins of Gipp.

A Chinese man believed to have been killed by lightning was actually done in by a small weather rocket found when it detonated during cremation, police say. Authorities said people who were in the Inner Mongolia province house with Wang Diange -- who was overseeing a wake at the time of his death -- discovered his body amidst rubble after a large explosion that destroyed half of the home's roof, The Daily Telegraph reported Tuesday.

Real estate has always been pricey in New York, but living six feet under just got more expensive. Across Brooklyn, funeral homes are losing money because many families cannot afford what they might have once paid to bury their relatives. While the economic downturn does not affect the death rate, many families are choosing to cremate instead of bury, saving between $2,000 and $4,000. And that's not their only concession.

For two years, man thought ashes were wife's. A former Huntsville resident is suing Laughlin Service Funeral Home alleging he was given the remains of a stranger after his deceased wife was cremated in 2006. The lawsuit was filed electronically in Madison County Circuit Court on Saturday on behalf of Richard Henry Parrott. Parrott seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.